The NFL has been highly criticized for many of its decisions of late, but allowing teams that were on bye week to participate in the “My Cause, My Cleats” campaign is a good move. Cleveland Browns wide receiver Terrelle Pryor is one of the players taking advantage of the opportunity, and is honoring a unique […]

The NFL has been highly criticized for many of its decisions of late, but allowing teams that were on bye week to participate in the “My Cause, My Cleats” campaign is a good move.

Cleveland Browns wide receiver Terrelle Pryor is one of the players taking advantage of the opportunity, and is honoring a unique group of people. Before Sunday’s Browns game against the Bengals, Pryor will wear cleats that bring awareness to the Special Olympics. And during the game, he will honor his grandma, his father, and the late sportscaster Stuart Scott.

Scott, who passed away at the age of 49, was widely admired by those on and off the field. Scott helped launch ESPN2 back in 1993 and became a mainstay in a lot of homes. His catchphrases “Boo-Yah” and “cool as the other side of the pillow” were some of the biggest pop culture touchstones that ESPN has ever had the pleasure of airing.

Scott’s fight against cancer became a battle that employees of ESPN monitored closely, but that fight also began to leak into the day-to-day lives of the viewers as well. Scott was a compelling figure and always was positive despite his illness. Clearly he’s been a big influence on Pryor, and these cleats serve as a very cool tribute.

Scout Media’s no-good-very-bad 2016 is ending in the same fashion as the company announced Friday that it has filed voluntary petitions for relief under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code, per an internal memo sent to Awful Announcing (and confirmed by the Wall Street Journal). Scout filed the petitions Thursday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the […]

Scout Media’s no-good-very-bad 2016 is ending in the same fashion as the company announced Friday that it has filed voluntary petitions for relief under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code, per an internal memo sent to Awful Announcing (and confirmed by the Wall Street Journal).

Scout filed the petitions Thursday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York on the heels of an involuntary Chapter 11 petition from three creditors claiming the company owes almost $800,000. Despite initially telling the Wall Street Journal that the “network would continue operating normally,” the bankruptcy plans could change that drastically.

If the bankruptcy wins a judge’s approval and is allowed to proceed, it would force Scout Media to create a plan to repay its creditors and could spell the end of the sports network altogether. Scout Media has 21 days to reply to the bankruptcy filing. Judge Michael Wiles will oversee the case.

The companies at the heart of the bankruptcy petition appear to be print services company LSC Communications (claiming $671,651 owed), Seattle staffing agency iMatch Services ($81,613) and catering company On Safari Foods ($29,116). LSC had sued Scout in November 2015 when it failed to pay on a contract. The two sides settled out of court in April for $667,001 but that deal fell apart when Scout allegedly defaulted on a $34,555 payment.

Things have been trending downward for Scout for much of 2016. When the company’s board terminated CEO Jim Heckman in July, the product team resigning en masse. It was also revealed that contributor payments were often a week late or more and reports that Scout hadn’t paid anyone on time in “several months.” The process of replacing the product team reportedly moved slowly and multiple former publishers aired their grievances, all of which culminates in the latest development.

“According to court papers filed Friday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan, a “perfect storm of an unsustainable balance sheet” as well as financial pressures caused by the abrupt departure of the company’s chief executive left the ailing business with no choice but to try to place its assets in the hands of a new owner as quickly as possible.

Scout Media has been exploring the possibility of a sale since September, court papers show, but no formal offers have materialized. With the help of a consultant, the company contacted 154 potential buyers, of which 20 have expressed interest but haven’t put forward bids.

In papers filed in bankruptcy court, lawyers for the company have proposed a court-supervised process in which bids for Scout Media’s assets would be due Jan. 17. An auction would be held in Wilmington, Del., Jan. 19, with a hearing to approve the winner scheduled for the following week. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michael Wiles will oversee the auction process, a fixture of chapter 11 sales that is meant to ensure the company receives the best possible offer for its assets.

Following the auction, the company says it plans to wind down. Proceeds from the proposed sale could one day be used to repay its creditors, at least in part. In court papers filed Thursday, Scout pegged its total assets and liabilities each between $10 million and $50 million.”

“I think it’s a travesty that so many great men and women throughout the Scout network might possibly financially suffer due to too much over-promising and under-delivering from the executive level – both current and past leadership,” a former executive at a competing college football recruiting network told Awful Announcing. “I recruited my fair share of talent from competition; however, I knew my company’s financial limitations and would never jeopardize the corporation or the individuals.”

Below the memo publishers received from President, Craig Amazeen:

Scout will formally announce today that it has filed voluntary petitions for relief under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code. The petitions were filed last night in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York.

Scout’s board of directors unanimously determined that a sale through the Chapter 11 process under Bankruptcy Code section 363 is in the best interest of the company, employees, publishers, customers, creditors and stakeholders. The process allows Scout to continue normal business operations while orchestrating an orderly restructuring of the company and continuing the already-in-motion sales process.

Important notes:– I will send out additional information as the day progresses including an expected press release.

– We will have an all publisher / employee / contractor call early next week

– This is all being handled at the corporate level and will not impact our day to day operations. So for the benefit of our millions of users – please continue to operate in a “business as usual” fashion, providing the fantastic content and communities that they’ve come to expect.

– Any media requests / sales process requests / or other outside inquiries should be directed to (redcacted)

Additional details later today.

Thank you for your continued, united efforts.

Hopefully the limbo publishers face under the Scout network begins to find a much more solid footing in 2017.

If you would like to ask about or request ratings for a program or event on these networks, please reach Douglas on Twitter @SonOfTheBronx. ESPN Top 25 (and Select) Programs For searching an event or program on this page, type CTRL-F in your browser (if browser is capable) then type your event/program title in the […]

If you would like to ask about or request ratings for a program or event on these networks, please reach Douglas on Twitter @SonOfTheBronx.

ESPN Top 25 (and Select) Programs

For searching an event or program on this page, type CTRL-F in your browser (if browser is capable) then type your event/program title in the search box.

VIEWER
RANK

PROGRAM

DATE

START
TIME

END
TIME

VIEWERS
(000)

A18-49
(000)

1

NFL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Mon 11/28/16

8:15 PM

11:36 PM

13064

5421

GREEN BAY/PHILADELPHIA

2

SPORTSCENTER (live)

Mon 11/28/16

11:36 PM

1:00 AM

2988

1484

3

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Wed 11/30/16

9:18 PM

11:29 PM

1973

865

NORTH CAROLINA/INDIANA

4

NBA REGULAR SEASON (live)

Fri 12/02/16

8:01 PM

10:25 PM

1713

881

CLEVELAND/CHICAGO

5

MONDAY NIGHT COUNTDOWN (live)

Mon 11/28/16

6:00 PM

8:15 PM

1670

793

6

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Tue 11/29/16

9:32 PM

11:31 PM

1652

749

MICHIGAN STATE/DUKE

7

COLLEGE GAMEDAY (live)

Sat 12/03/16

9:00 AM

12:01 PM

1540

690

8

NFL COUNTDOWN (live)

Sun 12/04/16

10:00 AM

12:00 PM

1440

754

9

CFP RANKINGS SHOW (live)

Sun 12/04/16

12:00 PM

4:00 PM

1328

613

10

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Tue 11/29/16

7:30 PM

9:19 PM

1272

503

SYRACUSE/WISCONSIN

11

NFL PRIMETIME

Mon 11/28/16

1:00 AM

2:00 AM

1267

686

12

NBA REGULAR SEASON (live)

Fri 12/02/16

10:25 PM

12:57 AM

1215

646

HOUSTON/DENVER

13

CFP RANKINGS SHOW (live)

Tue 11/29/16

7:00 PM

7:30 PM

1188

551

14

COLLEGE BASKETBALL SCOREBOARD (live)

Tue 11/29/16

9:19 PM

9:32 PM

1185

525

15

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

Mon 11/28/16

5:30 PM

6:00 PM

1184

548

16

SPORTSCENTER LATE (live)

Wed 11/30/16

11:29 PM

12:00 AM

1169

584

17

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Wed 11/30/16

7:15 PM

9:18 PM

1112

415

PURDUE/LOUISVILLE

18

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

Tue 11/29/16

5:30 PM

6:00 PM

980

523

19

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

Thu 12/01/16

5:30 PM

6:00 PM

958

492

20

SPORTSCENTER 12AM (live)

Sat 12/03/16

12:00 AM

1:25 AM

937

481

21

COLLEGE FOOTBALL AFTERNOON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

12:01 PM

3:54 PM

926

374

LOUISIANA TECH/WESTERN KENTUCKY

22

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

Wed 11/30/16

5:30 PM

6:00 PM

893

437

23

SPORTSCENTER LATE (live)

Tue 11/29/16

11:31 PM

1:00 AM

868

437

24

SPORTSCENTER:

Mon 11/28/16

2:00 AM

3:00 AM

844

434

25

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

Fri 12/02/16

5:30 PM

6:00 PM

831

365

27

NFL INSIDERS: SUNDAY (live)

Sun 12/04/16

9:00 AM

10:00 AM

813

477

31

COLLEGE FOOTBALL PRIME (live)

Sat 12/03/16

7:43 PM

11:31 PM

713

231

SAN DIEGO STATE/WYOMING

33

NBA PRE-GAME (live)

Fri 12/02/16

7:00 PM

8:01 PM

684

358

NBA COUNTDOWN

36

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

5:33 PM

7:38 PM

656

250

GONZAGA/ARIZONA

38

BASKETBALL:

Wed 11/30/16

7:00 PM

7:15 PM

643

287

JIM VALVANO- ESPYS

44

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

3:54 PM

5:33 PM

600

233

STANFORD/KANSAS

80

NFL MATCH-UP

Sat 12/03/16

3:00 AM

3:30 AM

441

266

87

WOMEN’S COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sun 12/04/16

4:00 PM

5:52 PM

425

135

TEXAS/CONNECTICUT

115

E:60

Thu 12/01/16

8:30 PM

9:00 PM

349

156

PENNY SAVE

123

FANTASY FOOTBALL KICKOFF (live)

Tue 11/29/16

2:30 PM

3:00 PM

327

184

124

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Thu 12/01/16

9:00 PM

11:01 PM

319

140

CINCINNATI/IOWA STATE

In total viewership for its entire week in Prime Time (8 p.m. to 11 p.m.), ESPN is down -11 percent (2,681,000 vs. 3,012,000) from one week earlier and up +3 percent (2,681,000 vs. 2,601,000) from the same week one year ago (November 30-December 6, 2015).

In total viewership for its entire week in Total Day (6 a.m. to 5:59 a.m.), ESPN is down -22 percent (916,000 vs. 1,174,000) from one week earlier and down -12 percent (916,000 vs. 1,042,000) from the same week one year ago (November 30-December 6, 2015).

For searching an event or program on this page, type CTRL-F in your browser (if browser is capable) then type your event/program title in the search box.

VIEWER
RANK

PROGRAM

DATE

START
TIME

END
TIME

VIEWERS
(000)

A18-49
(000)

1

COLLEGE FOOTBALL PRIME (live)

Fri 12/02/16

6:54 PM

10:43 PM

1358

404

WESTERN MICHIGAN/OHIO

2

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Mon 11/28/16

7:00 PM

9:00 PM

662

237

KENTUCKY/ARIZONA STATE

3

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Wed 11/30/16

9:20 PM

11:21 PM

459

160

OHIO STATE/VIRGINIA

4

FANTASY SHOW (live)

Sun 12/04/16

11:00 AM

1:00 PM

379

223

5

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Wed 11/30/16

7:15 PM

9:20 PM

369

122

VIRGINIA TECH/MICHIGAN

6

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Tue 11/29/16

9:04 PM

11:01 PM

362

149

IOWA/NOTRE DAME

7

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Tue 11/29/16

7:00 PM

9:04 PM

355

142

PITTSBURGH/MARYLAND

8

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

5:33 PM

7:30 PM

347

97

MAINE/DUKE

9

SPORTSCENTER WEEKEND-AM (live)

Sun 12/04/16

9:00 AM

11:00 AM

345

168

10

FIRST TAKE (live)

Mon 11/28/16

10:00 AM

12:00 PM

340

165

11

SPORTSCENTER LATE (live)

Fri 12/02/16

10:43 PM

12:00 AM

333

122

12

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

Thu 12/01/16

6:30 PM

7:00 PM

327

172

13

MIKE & MIKE IN THE MORNING (live)

Mon 11/28/16

6:00 AM

10:00 AM

322

151

14

FIRST TAKE (live)

Tue 11/29/16

10:00 AM

12:00 PM

313

170

15

FIRST TAKE (live)

Fri 12/02/16

10:00 AM

12:00 PM

311

148

16

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

Tue 11/29/16

6:30 PM

7:00 PM

308

157

17

COLLEGE FOOTBALL SCOREBOARD (live)

Sat 12/03/16

3:17 PM

3:30 PM

307

104

18

FIRST TAKE (live)

Wed 11/30/16

10:00 AM

12:00 PM

304

156

19

COLLEGE FOOTBALL COUNTDOWN (live)

Fri 12/02/16

6:30 PM

6:54 PM

285

145

20

MIKE & MIKE IN THE MORNING (live)

Tue 11/29/16

6:00 AM

10:00 AM

274

132

21

COLLEGE FOOTBALL AFTERNOON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

12:00 PM

3:17 PM

269

92

TROY/GEORGIA SOUTHERN

22

ESPN ORIGINAL DOCUMENTARY

Mon 11/28/16

9:00 PM

10:30 PM

268

128

30 FOR 30: PHI SLAMA JAMA

22

MIKE & MIKE IN THE MORNING (live)

Fri 12/02/16

6:00 AM

10:00 AM

268

123

24

FIRST TAKE (live)

Thu 12/01/16

10:00 AM

12:00 PM

265

131

25

MIKE & MIKE IN THE MORNING (live)

Thu 12/01/16

6:00 AM

10:00 AM

257

118

27

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

3:30 PM

5:33 PM

249

100

XAVIER/BAYLOR

28

SPORTS REPORTERS

Sun 12/04/16

8:30 AM

9:00 AM

237

96

31

COLLEGE FOOTBALL PRIME (live)

Sat 12/03/16

7:30 PM

11:19 PM

228

60

ARKANSAS STATE/TEXAS STATE

38

WOMEN’S COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Thu 12/01/16

7:00 PM

9:07 PM

215

63

SOUTH CAROLINA/TEXAS

39

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sun 12/04/16

4:00 PM

6:00 PM

213

68

SOUTHEAST MISSOURI/INDIANA

51

OUTSIDE THE LINES-WEEKEND

Sun 12/04/16

8:00 AM

8:30 AM

184

82

111

NACION ESPN (live)

Mon 11/28/16

5:00 PM

6:00 PM

90

43

112

WOMEN’S COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sun 12/04/16

2:00 PM

3:54 PM

88

22

BAYLOR/TENNESSEE

113

ESPORTS

Sun 12/04/16

8:30 PM

9:45 PM

87

46

CAPCOM CUP FINAL

122

HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL (live)

Thu 12/01/16

9:07 PM

10:44 PM

74

27

HAMILTON HEIGHTS (TN)/MEMPHIS EAST (TN)

131

VICE WORLD

Sun 12/04/16

10:00 PM

10:30 PM

54

30

BAYOU CLASSIC

133

VICE WORLD

Sun 12/04/16

10:30 PM

11:00 PM

50

30

JAKE AND ZANE

In total viewership for its entire week in Prime Time (8 p.m. to 11 p.m.), ESPN2 is down -5 percent (423,000 vs. 447,000) from one week earlier and down -6 percent (423,000 vs. 448,000) from the same week one year ago (November 30-December 6, 2015).

In total viewership for its entire week in Total Day (6 a.m. to 5:59 a.m.), ESPN2 is down -22 percent (232,000 vs. 299,000) from one week earlier and down -14 percent (232,000 vs. 270,000) from the same week one year ago (November 30-December 6, 2015).

For searching an event or program on this page, type CTRL-F in your browser (if browser is capable) then type your event/program title in the search box.

VIEWER
RANK

PROGRAM

DATE

START
TIME

END
TIME

VIEWERS
(000)

A18-49
(000)

1

COLLEGE FOOTBALL SUNDAY (live)

Sun 12/04/16

8:00 AM

12:00 PM

228

91

2

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

2:04 PM

4:04 PM

216

66

WEST VIRGINIA/VIRGINIA

3

CHAMPIONSHIP DRIVE (live)

Sun 12/04/16

4:00 PM

6:00 PM

181

54

4

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Tue 11/29/16

9:04 PM

11:04 PM

171

51

NC STATE/ILLINOIS

5

NCAA FOOTBALL (live)

Sat 12/03/16

4:04 PM

7:58 PM

160

45

GRAMBLING/ALCORN STATE

6

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Mon 11/28/16

7:00 PM

9:22 PM

138

37

MINNESOTA/FLORIDA STATE

7

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Tue 11/29/16

7:00 PM

9:04 PM

137

35

GEORGIA TECH/PENN STATE

8

SPORTSCENTERU (live)

Sat 12/03/16

7:58 PM

8:04 PM

136

38

9

WOMEN’S COLLEGE SOCCER TOURNAMENT (live)

Fri 12/02/16

7:36 PM

9:39 PM

133

35

GEORGETOWN/USC

10

WOMEN’S COLLEGE SOCCER TOURNAMENT (live)

Sun 12/04/16

6:00 PM

8:07 PM

131

57

USC/WEST VIRGINIA

11

ESPN ORIGINAL DOCUMENTARY

Sun 12/04/16

12:00 PM

1:30 PM

124

72

30 FOR 30: PHI SLAMA JAMA

12

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Mon 11/28/16

9:22 PM

11:07 PM

113

30

WAKE FOREST/NORTHWESTERN

13

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Wed 11/30/16

9:19 PM

11:21 PM

107

41

NEBRASKA/CLEMSON

13

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Fri 12/02/16

9:39 PM

11:47 PM

107

38

ALABAMA/TEXAS

15

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

8:04 PM

10:16 PM

102

21

BYU/USC

16

COLLEGE FOOTBALL LIVE

Tue 11/29/16

5:00 PM

5:30 PM

97

54

17

COLLEGE FOOTBALL LIVE

Mon 11/28/16

5:30 PM

6:00 PM

94

38

18

COLLEGE FOOTBALL REPEAT

Fri 12/02/16

11:47 PM

2:41 AM

88

27

WESTERN MICHIGAN/OHIO STATE

19

COLLEGE FOOTBALL REPEAT

Sun 12/04/16

6:00 AM

8:00 AM

75

21

CLEMSON/VIRGINIA TECH

20

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Wed 11/30/16

7:15 PM

9:19 PM

72

30

RUTGERS/MIAMI (FL)

21

CFB DAILY (live)

Thu 12/01/16

4:00 PM

5:00 PM

71

36

22

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sat 12/03/16

12:00 PM

2:04 PM

70

17

WAKE FOREST/RICHMOND

23

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sun 12/04/16

8:07 PM

10:00 PM

69

23

BOWLING GREEN/CINCINNATI

23

COLLEGE FOOTBALL LIVE

Mon 11/28/16

5:00 PM

5:30 PM

69

23

25

COLLEGE FOOTBALL LIVE

Thu 12/01/16

5:00 PM

5:30 PM

67

35

28

WOMEN’S COLLEGE SOCCER TOURNAMENT (live)

Fri 12/02/16

5:00 PM

7:09 PM

64

27

NORTH CAROLINA/WEST VIRGINIA

40

COLLEGE HOCKEY REGULAR SEASON (live)

Thu 12/01/16

6:30 PM

8:49 PM

49

20

MICHIGAN/PENN STATE

54

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Sun 12/04/16

2:00 PM

3:51 PM

38

12

MARQUETTE/GEORGIA

59

COLLEGE BASKETBALL REGULAR SEASON (live)

Thu 12/01/16

9:00 PM

11:00 PM

37

19

OREGON STATE/MISSISSIPPI STATE

In total viewership for its entire week in Prime Time (8 p.m. to 11 p.m.), ESPNU is down -33 percent (191,000 vs. 151,000) from one week earlier and up +25 percent (101,000 vs. 81,000) from the same week one year ago (November 30-December 6, 2015).

In total viewership for its entire week in Total Day (6 a.m. to 5:59 a.m.), ESPNU is down -29 percent (58,000 vs. 82,000) from one week earlier and up +5 percent (58,000 vs. 55,000) from the same week one year ago (November 30-December 6, 2015).

Last week, ESPN Radio host and espnW columnist Sarah Spain released a podcast in which she asked a group of prominent women in sports media about their experiences in a male-dominated field, including instances of sexual harassment they’d endured. It was just the latest instance of Spain speaking up about women’s issues, no matter how many people on […]

Last week, ESPN Radio host and espnW columnist Sarah Spain released a podcast in which she asked a group of prominent women in sports media about their experiences in a male-dominated field, including instances of sexual harassment they’d endured. It was just the latest instance of Spain speaking up about women’s issues, no matter how many people on Twitter tell her to “go find a job and leave sports to the boys.”

Awful Announcing called Spain this week to talk about the podcast, the tradeoff between being “likable” and speaking up for causes she believes in and the absurdity of criticizing women like Jessica Mendoza and Doris Burke.

Here are some excerpts from that conversation:

On what motivated her to put together a podcast about sexual harassment in sports media:

I was trying to remember exactly what the impetus was when I first thought of it. You know, I had Jamele Hill as the first guest on my podcast, and I don’t remember if it was something she said during that interview or whether I just remember in talking to her, thinking about some of the experiences she said she had when she was starting up and remembering my own. I realized that there were probably a lot of women who had shared experiences similar to ours. She was my very first guest, and I decided right there that I would ask her, after the podcast was done, to stick around and record an answer for this.

And then I did that with a couple other people. There were some guests I had that I wish I could’ve asked this, but they were running out of time and they had to run out. But I might end up doing another one, if there’s desire for more.

I had never told the story about the interview that I went on before publicly, and I didn’t want it to be in a flippant way. I wanted it to be part of a larger message about how up-and-comers, knowing that other people have gone through it, might be better able to deal with it, knowing they’re not alone. So I just realized that putting together a bunch of stories would have a much bigger impact than telling mine on its own.

On the public response to the podcast:

I had a lot of people sharing their own stories, I had a lot of young women that were coming up and saying it was really beneficial to them, either because they’d already gone through it or because they felt like somehow it was their fault and that it was going to be an impediment to their careers. Or younger people who hadn’t dealt with it but felt much more capable of getting past it knowing that many successful women had had to deal with it.

And then I think a lot of people just hear this vague term of “sexual harassment,” and they know it goes on, but to hear the specifics of it is much more impactful. It made them sort of understand. And because a lot of people on that podcast are really well-liked and popular, people that are very strong-willed and have strong voices, for people to associate a specific person and personality with that, I think they really understand, in that person’s voice, just how difficult it is to deal with.

On nasty comments from men online:

I think so much of it stems from just a basic misogyny. Some of the responses that I got to me that were negative were people sending me a photo where I have cleavage, from like 12 years ago. Like, “oh, you’re such a victim.” And that’s that whole mindset of, “She was asking for it. Did you see what she was wearing?” The whole concept of, if a woman acts or dresses a certain way then she’s deserving of being mistreated.

And I think in a lot of ways, women are in this impossible catch-22, where they see what’s successful in the industry, they see who’s being given jobs, who’s being given chances, who’s moving up the ranks. And they then have to decide, am I going to stand to my principles and not fall into the trap of knowing that I need to look as beautiful as possible at all times? Or am I going to be this tomboy who just hangs out and doesn’t care about that stuff, and not get any on-camera jobs?

I wish I could describe it more, but there are men who believe that women don’t belong in certain spaces, and those are the very same men that also want to see hot chicks working in sports. As long as they are limited to certain roles and occupations, then it’s OK. And they’re going to feel the same way about harassment, that it’s not that big of a deal or that if you’re in that job you should just be willing to accept it, and if you’re in a male-dominated field then that just comes with it, instead of realizing that having real conversations about why it’s wrong or why it shouldn’t be the norm might actually improve things.

On ESPN baseball commentator Jessica Mendoza:

I’ll have these podcasts, and the women that are on are just blowing me away. Jessica Mendoza is a perfect example. People think she doesn’t have the bona fides to be on an MLB broadcast or that she just got hired because she’s pretty or whatever, but she’s an Olympian, she graduated Stanford in three years and then got her Masters in the fourth, while she was playing softball as an All-American and on the Olympic team. She was president of the Women’s Sports Foundation. She has two kids. She was pre-med and then switched into political science. She’s like, the best at everything. And she’s still one of the ones who gets it, which tells you it’s not people who are sitting at home really analyzing the work, it’s people who have already created a narrative in their head and now they’re going to validate that belief.

On ESPN basketball commentator Doris Burke:

There are just people in the industry who everyone knows are amazing, and it’s the people on the outside that aren’t even really paying attention that are critics. If everyone in the industry says that Doris Burke is mind-blowing because she covers college, professional, women’s, men, she has to know all the teams… then maybe you should listen to those people.

On diversity initiatives in hiring:

What stinks is that there’s this idea of affirmative action, quote unquote, being the reason for hiring women and people of color, instead of realizing that the world is made up of all these people, and the fact that it was 95 percent white males was the problem, not the fact that they’re hiring people that aren’t white males. I think if you decide that hiring a diversity of voices isn’t important, then you’re deeply flawed to begin with.

On speaking out about women’s issues instead of trying to blend in a male-dominated industry:

When I started out I definitely tried to blend in. I was working at FOX Sportsnet on a nightly highlight show, and there were usually about 50 or so people in the room every day, putting the show together, watching games, writing down highlights. It would usually be about three women and 45, 46 guys. That was my first real job in sports, so of course I tried to blend in and be one of the guys. And back then I used to think I was one of the guys. I was like, oh I have so many guy friends, and I think like a guy. And when I started at espnW and I met all these other women who were super passionate about sports and were athletes, I realized that’s not being a guy, that’s being a woman who’s super into sports, and it doesn’t have to fall into this idea of just blending in as one of the guys. You can still be very much yourself and just be into the things that you like.

And some point I had to make a decision: Do I want to just be as likable as possible? And trust me, I know how to drink beer and talk sports and crack jokes and do movie quotes with the best of them if I just want you to like me and think I’m a cool chick. But at some point I realized it is much more meaningful to me to have an impact, and so I try to balance that. I am who I am 100 percent of the time, but instead of not bringing up issues that bother me or not speaking up for women in the industry, not speaking up about domestic violence and sexual assault, instead of downplaying those in favor of things that are more easily digestible, I decided I’m going to do that and be myself and talk about beer and movie quotes and dick jokes and everything else.

On espnW and the perception that it’s not fairly integrated into the main ESPN brand:

That was a criticism when it started because people didn’t get why it needed its own space, which is funny because nobody worried about ESPNFC and soccer having its own space or Grantland. There was this idea that because it was women it must be being sort of “ghettoized,” is the word people used. What I found instead was that it allowed people to have a space they could go to where they knew they could get what they wanted, and then when those stories were interesting and big and well-done, they would make it to the front page, and they would make it to other sections. And now I feel like it’s very integrated. espnW personalities are all over the company. espnW has several radio shows, several podcasts, espnW columns and articles and stories are in the magazine and on the front page of the website. I don’t necessarily think of us as that different from any other aspect.

On innocuous-seeming comments that bug her:

There are people who are well-meaning, and they’ll say something like, “Oh, Erin Andrews quit her job, you should take it, you’re pretty enough to do that.” Or even someone in person the other day was like, “So they let you actually talk on the radio?” And I’m like, “Let me? I have my own show.” And he said “Oh I guess you’re pretty enough for that.” And I said, “It’s a radio show! What the fuck?”

So even if they’re trying to be complimentary sometimes, everything becomes reduced down to the only possible way that you’ve achieved anything is as a result of that, even if they’re trying to tell you it’s a good thing. So I think that bothers me the most, because so often women’s appearances eclipse their accomplishments, and if you continue to validate that aspect of it over everything else, that will keep happening.

I really hate when there are male allies and supporters of whatever it is we’re talking about, and the easy thing to say is, “Oh she’s not going to have sex with you just because you’re on her side.” Again, it’s like this ignorant reduction of every single act in life to whether or not you’re gonna get laid or not or whether someone is attractive or not. It’s such a simplistic way to go through life, to view everything through the prism of appearance or sex.

On whether harassment drives young women away from sports media:

I was just speaking at Penn State last week, and one of the teachers told me she had a general journalism class and one of the girls did an internship on the sports side to see if she might be interested in the sports aspect of it, and she said “Never again.” She said it was so awful, she hated the experience and she had no interest in going into the sports aspect of it anymore.

There’s this girl that I sort of mentor who just graduated from Mizzou, and she told me she follows my career and is so worried she won’t be able to handle the stuff that I handle, that she doesn’t have the thick skin for it. And that sucks.

On what men can do to make sports media more hospitable to women:

I think what’s key is to embrace perspectives other than yours, to be willing to listen to other people’s experiences, not to discount them. Like when they do panels of the best sportswriting, and then it ends up being 48 white males and then one black guy and one woman or when they do “up-and-coming voices” and then it’s all dudes. To have this perspective that there’s other people out there that have things to say and that have other perspectives to offer.

If you’re in a position to hire, trying to understand that having a diversity of voices will be beneficial to your company and to you and the way that you view things is the biggest. And then if you’re not in a position to hire, then offering to mentor up-and-comers, offering to introduce them to people in the industry. Finding ways to just sort of reach out.

The people over at Fox are quite excited about Saturday night’s MLS Cup between Toronto FC and the Seattle Sounders, the first MLS title match on English language network television since Columbus and New York played on ABC in 2008. “There’s a greater reach, a greater prestige to it,” said Fox Sports announcer John Strong— […]

The people over at Fox are quite excited about Saturday night’s MLS Cup between Toronto FC and the Seattle Sounders, the first MLS title match on English language network television since Columbus and New York played on ABC in 2008.

“There’s a greater reach, a greater prestige to it,” said Fox Sports announcer John Strong— who will be calling Saturday night’s game with Brad Friedel and Julie Stewart-Binks— in an interview earlier this week with Awful Announcing.

The time slot and date of the game should also work to MLS’ advantage. It’s the first fall weekend without college football at night, with its main competition being ESPN’s presentation of the Heisman Trophy.

“It’s a fairly quiet landscape,” Strong said. “So that’s what I love, is how Fox and the league really worked together to say, let’s make this a big deal. Let’s give this a prestigious spot.”

Fox Sports 1 will provide its fair share of coverage over the weekend as well, beginning with a preview show that airs Friday night at 10 with Rob Stone joining Alexi Lalas, Eric Wynalda, Stu Holden, Sigi Schmid (who was fired as Seattle’s head coach in July) and Sports Illustrated’s Grant Wahl.

Fox will have pregame coverage at 7:30 eastern Saturday night, including an exclusive interview with U.S. Men’s National Team head coach Bruce Arena, followed by the game broadcast at 8 and the postgame show thereafter on FS1.

Since Toronto had the better regular season record, BMO Field will host the match with an estimated crowd of 36,000 expected to attend, according to Strong. That would be a few thousand more than the attendance for last month’s Canadian Football League Grey Cup, which saw 33,421 fans fill BMO’s seats.

“The renovations they did, the expansion,” Strong said, “it really looks like a big time stadium.”

Both Toronto and Seattle are making their first MLS Cup appearances, and feature star power on both sides. USMNT stalwarts Michael Bradley and Jozy Altidore play for Toronto F.C., while rising national team star Jordan Morris plays for Seattle. Arena mentioned during the conference finals that he’ll be looking at another Sounders youngster, 21-year-old midfielder Cristian Roldan, for the national team’s January training camp. The Sounders also feature USMNT striker Clint Dempsey, but he’ll be out for the match while he looks to recover from an irregular heartbeat.

“It’s a matchup of big clubs in MLS that have recognizable star names,” Strong said. “And that’s an important thing when you’re trying to capture casual fans, casual soccer fans who may not watch MLS on a regular basis.”

Toronto also prominently features Italian striker Sebastian Giovinco, who was third in MLS in goals and second in assists during the regular season. With all the exciting offensive players in this game, viewers will likely not be getting a boring, slow-moving match on Saturday.

“I think you’ve got two teams that bring a lot of quality to the table, but also two teams that want to go forward, want to attack, want to play entertaining soccer,” Strong said. “So that’s where I think the odds of us having a really entertaining match are high.”

As of Friday morning, the weather in Toronto during the game was expected to be mostly clear with temperatures in the mid-20s, which would make it one of the coldest MLS Cups ever. And Strong is more than okay with that.

“For me growing up in the American sports world and being a football fan primarily, when you think of the cold weather, that’s the big games,” Strong said. “As the temperature drops, as you can see your breath, there are some snowflakes in the air— that means the playoffs, that means big time stuff. I would always rather it be freezing and just put on a few extra layers than all the games we do in the summer and it’s 100 degrees and I’m just sweating my face off on TV.”

Strong said that Fox will have numerous in-game features at its disposal, including the cable cam above the field, dirt cams embedded in the back of goals (which was used at this year’s All-Star Game and showed Tottenham’s Harry Kane blast a goal from a really unique angle), super slo-mo cams behind and goals and some interesting graphics.

“One of the things we take very seriously and we have a great pride in, is how the game sounds and how well the atmosphere comes through the television screen,” Strong said. “It’s less about us yammering on up in the booth, and more about really feeling what it would be like in the stadium. And I know it’s a big priority for our bosses and something we’re really going to make as a big deal, that you’re really going to hear and feel the atmosphere.”

The goal this weekend for Fox and MLS is that the first championship game on network TV in nearly a decade ends up being a world class broadcast.

“Fox is not messing around with this stuff, and is really plowing in some big resources,” Strong said. “Our hope and goal is that the game lives up.”

Scottie Pippen was court side for last night’s Bulls game. He inexplicably is brother in arms with Jason Whitlock on the fashion front. Obviously Pippen being in attendance is something a broadcast is going to acknowledge. Shit, anyone on some of those 90’s Bulls teams is probably worth a mention, even Jud Buechler. But when Albert did […]

Scottie Pippen was court side for last night’s Bulls game. He inexplicably is brother in arms with Jason Whitlock on the fashion front.

Obviously Pippen being in attendance is something a broadcast is going to acknowledge. Shit, anyone on some of those 90’s Bulls teams is probably worth a mention, even Jud Buechler.

But when Albert did acknowledge Pippen, we were treated this odd exchange as he mistakes the guy next to him as Mark Zuckerberg.

Albert then backtracks (maybe because someone in his ear told him he was wrong). Chris Webber didn’t seem sure but didn’t correct him. So who is Pippen talking to?

It turns out it actually is a billionaire, just one who apparently is the worst kind. From Deadspin in 2011:

The guy you’re referencing is Matthew Pritzker, the heir to the Pritzker Hyatt Hotel fortune. I went to school at American University in Washington, DC with this kid. He’s a complete douchebag and has a private jet that he frequently used to take freshmen girls to South Beach… long after he dropped out of school. This is also the kid who sued his dad over his trust fund. He’s from Chicago though… so at least he’s not a complete poser? Still a dick, though.

Sounds like a pretty cool dude. Between the Trumps, this dude, and the Hiltons, seems like this hotel old money produces a lot of cool and down to earth people you’d want to hang out with. Guarantee you Jud Buechler wouldn’t be wearing a fedora nor talking to someone like faux Zuckerberg.

Welcome once again to This Week In Hot Takes, a collection of all the hottest sports media takes. Make sure not to burn yourself on these ones, carefully selected from the week of December 2-8. 5. Phil Mushnick’s whining about late games: New York Post columnist Phil Mushnick is known for his rather cranky take […]

Welcome once again to This Week In Hot Takes, a collection of all the hottest sports media takes. Make sure not to burn yourself on these ones, carefully selected from the week of December 2-8.

5. Phil Mushnick’s whining about late games: New York Post columnist Phil Mushnick is known for his rather cranky take on most things in the sports and sports media world, and this time around, he actually admitted it, beginning Monday’s column with “Believe me; I don’t wake up cranky, and I don’t sit down to watch sports cranky.” However, Mushnick then went right on to be incredibly cranky:

Friday, second half of the Colorado-Washington Pac-12 championship kicked off at 11:13 p.m., ET, on FOX. Forget it. Say good night, Gracie.

Sure, it was played on the West Coast, but the majority of the population lives east of the Mississippi. However, had this game been played at a logical time, say, late Saturday afternoon, FOX would have had to preempt “TMZ” and “Inside Edition.”

What Mushnick doesn’t realize is that the world doesn’t revolve around his viewing habits. That game started at 6 p.m. local time, which is astoundingly early for a game on a workday, and that was done to try to accommodate TV as much as possible. In fact, there’s an argument that the game was played too early; the attendance was announced as 47,118, less than many would have hoped for, and part of that’s the timing. (Other factors include the location in Santa Clara, the distance from the participating schools and more, but the timing certainly didn’t help.) Yes, the game could theoretically be played on Saturday, but it would lose some attention to the Big Ten, ACC and SEC championship games. The Pac-12 championship game is far from perfect, including on the timing front, but that timing is decided by calculating a bunch of factors. The crankiness of Phil Mushnick is not one of those, nor should it be.

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4. Shannon Sharpe and Chris Broussard call LeBron’s water bottle challenge “blatantly disrespectful” and “disrespectful to the utmost”: So, LeBron James and his Cavaliers’ teammates started trying to flip water bottles during a blowout win over the New York Knicks Wednesday night. Naturally, Fox’s talking heads had a field day, leading to this column’s first two-for-one inclusion (as they’re both complaining about the same thing, albeit in slightly different ways):

Why is this a thing that needs talking heads on two different shows to chime in on if it’s showing enough respect to a terrible opponent or not? Yes, athletes should just sit there on the bench in stony silence until asked again to contribute their physical labors. You know what’s disrespectful? The president of a team calling an opposing athlete’s friends and associates “a posse.” Flipping water bottles while on the bench during the blowout of that president’s awful basketball team seems minor by comparison. At least Sharpe tries to bring that up a bit, but both he and Broussard are launching significant unnecessary heat at James over this.

Surprise, surprise; the completely-unnecessary addition of Rob “Cornball Brother” Parker to Undisputed has produced hot takery. This time around, we have Parker talking about how Tom Brady deserves the widespread adulation of Derek Jeter (hate to break it to you, Rob, but there are plenty who hate “Pastadiving” Jeter as well, or at least feel he doesn’t deserve to be Jeterated), but doesn’t get it because people (possibly including Rob, from the way he presents this?) think he cheated:

This take is just generally dumb. First off, almost no athletes are universally revered. Most are liked by their team’s fans and hated by the opposition. Beyond that, Parker’s allegations here are along the lines of some of the more despicable attempts at connecting players to steroids with no evidence that we’ve seen in baseball. He’s “gotta ask the question.” Just go away, Rob.

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2. Clay Travis thinks Ron Rivera should be firedfor Cam Newton dress code incident: Look, Carolina Panthers’ head coach Ron Rivera’s move to (briefly) bench Cam Newton for not wearing a tie seemed pretty dumb, as did his handling of the fallout. However, Fox Sports Radio’s Clay Travis managed to one-up the dumbness by saying Rivera should be fired for this:

Yes, it’s been a disappointing season for the 4-8 Panthers. Yes, some of that is on Rivera. Yes, his dress code rules are ridiculous, and his punishment of his best player for breaking them is even worse. But this guy has proven to be a very good coach, and he got his team to a Super Bowl appearance last year. Should he be reevaluated after this year? Maybe, but a firing after one bad year would seem hasty given how close this team got to the top. But even reevaluating him on performance would make more sense than firing him based on a dress code. This happened, it was stupid, and it’s been resolved. It’s only the hot-take pundits like Travis that can’t move on.

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Jason Whitlock thinks professional football’s consequences are “yachts” and “money coming out of your ass”: Overall hot take leader Whitlock can always be relied upon to say something supremely dumb, and he did so again this week, railing against those who discuss the long-term consequences a violent sport like football can produce. Here’s Whitlock’s take on that:

First of all, “DirecTV commercials” are only an option for a very small subset of NFL players, and there are many more who can’t afford yachts and don’t have money running from their orifices. For every incredibly well-paid NFL player, there are plenty more on the margins, and plenty who aren’t even millionaires. The NFL’s minimum active-roster salary is $450,000 in 2016, which is nice, but not necessarily leading you to a life of extravagance. Meanwhile, practice squad players make at least $6,900 per week they’re on that squad, which is $117,300 over the course of a full season. Many aren’t on a practice roster that long, though, and while even $117,300 is a nice amount of money (and more than most make in other football leagues), it’s not yacht money.

Beyond that, though, Whitlock’s comments show a complete disregard for the many former football players who have had disastrous consequences from the sport, whether related to hip and knee replacements or long-term concussion issues. They’re particularly insensitive in the week where former NFL first-round pick Rashaan Salaam reportedly committed suicide at age 42; we don’t yet know if that was related to NFL issues, but it may have been. Yes, football can be a great sport for many, and so can playing in the NFL. But it can also have major negative consequences for many who play. Writing those consequences off is stupid, especially for someone who never played professional football and has no idea what those players go through.

There are a lot of good reasons for Disney to keep ESPN among its properties for the foreseeable future. The behemoth sports network remains the No. 1 player in the game, attracting way more eyeballs than any of its rivals. It’s a great platform for Disney to showcase and advertise its entertainment offerings. ESPN and ABC […]

There are a lot of good reasons for Disney to keep ESPN among its properties for the foreseeable future. The behemoth sports network remains the No. 1 player in the game, attracting way more eyeballs than any of its rivals. It’s a great platform for Disney to showcase and advertise its entertainment offerings. ESPN and ABC has a very synergistic relationship and work well together in the sports landscape. Plus, with Disney’s investment in BAMTech, that’s a key part of ESPN’s forthcoming over-the-top offering and offering that service without the Worldwide Leader would render it toothless.

There’s also one really good reason for Disney to consider dumping ESPN after 20 years of ownership: stock prices.

No matter what positives seem to pop up for Disney across their many brands, everything seems to come back to the ongoing shedding of subscribers that ESPN can’t seem to stop. After topping out at 99 million in 2013, they’ve lost nine million in the years since, including a shocking 621,000 customers between this past October and November. Combined with lost subscribers for ESPN2 and ESPNU and it was a total of 1.903 million homes in one month.

But it’s not just LaChapelle making the case for the split. The floodgates are officially open on speculation about a potential sale.

Brian Fung at the Hartford Courant mentions Steve Cahall, a media analyst at RBC Capital Markets, who made a compelling case for the media and entertainment titan to sell off ESPN. Not only would it give Disney investors a clearer picture of how well the company is doing, but it would also provide them with a cash infusion while also positioning them for a potential future merger.

Experts on both sides point to streaming and the upcoming BAMTech service as ways that ESPN will be able to rebound. On one hand, ESPN can afford to weather these storms and tinker with the new technology because they’re just one part of Disney’s much larger portfolio. On the other hand, will success with streaming and online services ever really be able to match up with the salad days of ESPN getting fat on cable subscription fees? It feels unlikely, at least for now. Just ask HBO how easy it is.

Especially when ESPN needs to remain competitive in terms of broadcasting rights. They’ve never had so much competition for the major sports leagues and the fees for individual league and college sports packages keep climbing. A bubble is going to burst for someone, or everyone, sooner or later.

“Let’s face it – sports has changed,” said Jim Hill, a longtime Disney analyst. “It’s gotten so expensive . . . it’s a scary time all around the barn right now for sports, and that’s another thing that Disney’s eyeballing.” The cost of media rights for sports programming reached a collective $16.3 billion last year, according to a report from PricewaterhouseCoopers – up 50 percent from 2011. That figure is expected to grow another 30 percent by 2020.

Perhaps the larger question is, who would want to buy ESPN if they were for sale? Cable giants, perhaps? Amazon or Apple? If so, how do they leverage ESPN in a way that Disney can’t?

Ultimately, it’s not as simple as saying Disney needs to dump ESPN in order to get its stock prices up. ESPN is tangled in a much larger web and a vision that goes into a media future we’re still figuring out. If any company can have patience while a former money-making arm learns how to adapt to the changing marketplace, it’s Disney.

In any conversation about ESPN’s NBA Countdown, someone invariably wonders why the show can’t be more like TNT’s Inside the NBA. While Inside the NBA is loose and fun and spontaneous, NBA Countdown can feel rigid and formulaic. But Jalen Rose, who is in his fourth season on Countdown, says the comparison isn’t quite fair. Asked by The Big Lead’s Ryan Glasspiegel about the success of […]

In any conversation about ESPN’s NBA Countdown, someone invariably wonders why the show can’t be more like TNT’s Inside the NBA. While Inside the NBA is loose and fun and spontaneous, NBA Countdown can feel rigid and formulaic.

But Jalen Rose, who is in his fourth season on Countdown, says the comparison isn’t quite fair.

Asked by The Big Lead’s Ryan Glasspiegel about the success of his radio show with David Jacoby, which re-airs on ESPN2 late at night during the week, the former NBA star slipped in a defense of Countdown

As much as you want talent to be in a prime slot, we [Jalen & Jacoby] know that we’re unorthodox in a lot of different ways, so we always kind of joke that we’re glad we’re on when the suits are asleep. That’s our internal joke.

It’s almost like when people were comparing Countdown to Inside the NBA. Countdown, that’s a show that comes on Sunday afternoon, so you have an audience that might be infant to elderly, so there’s a different way you entertain that audience. Whereas Inside the NBA, that comes on at 12, 1 in the morning. You can have Area 21, that’s almost late-night TV.

Rose has a point, to a certain extent. While Countdown airsat 7 p.m. during the week and in the afternoon on Sunday, Inside the NBA comes on late at night on Thursdays, when the audience is NBA nerds and college kids. It makes sense that the shows would take on slightly different tones.

But that doesn’t totally excuse the fact that NBA Countdown doesn’t have Inside the NBA’s appeal. People like Inside the NBA not necessarily for the off-color humor and occasionally PG-13 teasing but for the chemistry between its analysts. Plenty of shows have achieved that camaraderie in the morning or evening, and somewhere out there exists a winning formula NBA Countdown.

Rose is right that Countdown can never be exactly the same as Inside the NBA, but there’s no reason it can’t be as good.

The Kansas City Chiefs picked up a huge AFC West win over the Oakland Raiders on Thursday Night Football this week. But there’s one play from the fourth quarter of the 21-13 victory that is drawing some extra scrutiny this morning in the aftermath of the game. Could the game have been changed because of a […]

The Kansas City Chiefs picked up a huge AFC West win over the Oakland Raiders on Thursday Night Football this week. But there’s one play from the fourth quarter of the 21-13 victory that is drawing some extra scrutiny this morning in the aftermath of the game.

Could the game have been changed because of a Derek Carr pass hitting one of the wires for the SpiderCam that hangs over the field of play? There are Raiders fans that definitely believe that’s the case.

The play happened with just under 10 minutes to go in the 4th quarter on 3rd and 7 with the Raiders inside their own 30 yard line. Derek Carr steps up in the pocket and throws deep downfield for Amari Cooper, who has a step on the rest of the Chiefs secondary. It looks like a surefire touchdown until the play weirdly falls apart and Cooper just sort of stumbles with his hands up in the air.

The intrigue is only bolstered by Cooper’s postgame remarks about the play. After the game, Cooper said the ball moved on him at the last moment and this ESPN.com recap references the theories about whether or not SpiderCam played a role in the incompletion:

Yet, Carr was off and badly out of sync with his receivers all night, perhaps no more so than in the fourth quarter, when he had Amari Cooper wide open on a scramble drill, but Cooper took a bad angle and simply missed the ball.

Cooper said the ball moved on him at the last second and several fans have said that replays show the ball hitting NBC’s camera wire that goes over the field.

“That’s why it looked like I might have stumbled,” said Cooper, who had five catches for 29 yards. “I was running in the right direction and it kind of moved inside at the last minute and I didn’t have time to get it.”

If the pass did indeed hit the wire and one of the officials, coaches, or players saw it, the down should have been replayed. Here’s the relevant rule from the NFL rulebook for when a dead ball should be declared:

But was that actually the case? Did the Raiders lose a touchdown because of the pass hitting a wire?

You can see how the basic SkyCam/SpiderCam is set up here with the connecting wires holding the camera up over the field of play. Even though the camera would be safely behind the play behind the quarterback, the camera is held up by anchor points and wires connecting to four corners of the stadium.

This schematic is closer to the play in question and where the wires *could* have been, with the Raiders backed up in their own territory. It’s impossible to know without a blueprint from NBC where exactly they would be attached at Arrowhead Stadium.

Here’s where conjecture and speculation ultimately come into play because it’s impossible to say for sure what happened just based on the video evidence. Those wires are so tiny that you couldn’t possibly see them from the game footage and the replays. If the ball did hit the wire, it likely would have happened out of frame as the pass goes up looking like a spiral and comes down looking like a wounded duck. Ironically enough, NBC showed a replay from the SpiderCam that shows the ball falling down out of the sky.

Judging by that angle, where the camera is, and where the ball falls out of the air, the SpiderCam wire would have to go more vertically up and down the field as opposed to diagonally out to the corners of the stadium. At least that’s what memories of my 8th grade geometry class is telling me.

So did this pass really get deflected by a SpiderCam wire? Are the Raiders cursed by the Holy Roller to lose games from here till the end of time by tuck rules and camera wires? Here’s where we default to Occam’s Razor.

In order to believe the SpiderCam theory, we have to assume that Carr’s pass flew to a point with the perfect height and place on the field to hit a wire that would be just centimeters thick. We also have to assume that the wires would be consistently over the center of the field, providing a risk to almost every offensive play that something like this could happen. We also have to believe that the officials, players, and coaches on the field watching the play all missed it in real-time with the best possible view.

Conversely, we could assume that the trajectory of the ball was affected by a late gust of wind or that Carr’s deep throw was affected by the cold weather and the dislocated pinkie finger on his throwing hand. In total, Carr was only 17/41 last night throwing the football at Arrowhead.

Is it possible that this pass hit an NBC SpiderCam wire? Yes, of course it’s possible. But is that the most likely explanation for the play? That’s much tougher to say.